I've got Dish. The other night, I sort of impulsively added HBO and Showtime to our subscription for $22 bucks. I had to have Showtime because I really wanted to get the Sundance channel, on which I watched a devastating documentary last night about the decisions made to go to war in Iraq and how the occupation was totally and completely botched by, among others, Condi Rice.

I paid for it by dropping from AT250 to AT200, and ditching the Platinum HD. When Dish dropped the Voom HD networks, their full-on HD offering became superfluous. In this instance, Platinum is not really the FTL or whatever.

The channels we lost were inconsequential compared to what we have now. I think we finally got rid of about 147 or so audio-only channels. The only ones that hurt a bit to lose were the Fine Living channel and National Geographic HD. HBO's Real **** more than makes up for what little african tribal t&a NatGeo has been showing as of late, and some savings in my monthly wine budget should be reflected in not having Fine Living anymore. We also lost the Science channel. But the programming on that seems to be offered eventually (or originally) on other Discovery Network channels or on PBS, so no big deal.

All in all, win/win. It was really nice to catch a bit of some sort of "Inside the NFL" program on HBO or Showtime, where they play audio of all the sideline chatter and trash talking out on the field. I always wondered about all that. In one instance, some cornerback said to wide receiver as they were going back to their huddles, "You're so old, you on pension AND taking social security." Sure enough, later in the game the wide receiver catches a TD pass after losing the CB later. That little programming nugget pretty much covered the new bottom line $2 monthly increased subscription right there. I figure the rest of the month is all bonus.